Stephen Hawking Wiki
Welcome to Stephen Hawking Wiki ' ' Stephen Hawking Wiki is all about the life of one of the most famous, inspirational and smartest men in the world, Stephen William Hawking. ☀ Stephen Hawking was one of the most famous people of all time. Stephen. was born in Oxford, England, on January 8, 1942. At that time, his parents lived in London but moved to Oxford so Stephen can be born. When he was eight his family moved to St. Albans, a town about 20 miles north of London. Stephen went to St. Alban's School. During his first few months, he was not good at school and had very poor grades. The teachers claimed that he did little to no work. Stephen was always unhappy at school even when he was playing with others on the playground. A duckster’s site said “Stephen enjoyed math and science in school where he earned the nickname Einstein." During his elementary school days, Stephen was interested in math and science.At age 20, during his teenage time, Stephen graduated to University College. For his career his dad recommended to study medicine, however Stephen wanted to study math. At that time though, Mathematics was not available at The University College. He decided to study physics instead. Having studied physics for a while, Stephen earned a first-class honors degree. After collage, Stephen went on to research at Trinity Hall, University of Cambridge, for a PhD in Astronomy and Cosmology. Stephen Hawking At age 20, during his teenage time, Stephen graduated to University College. For his career his dad recommended to study medicine, however Stephen wanted to study math. At that time though, Mathematics was not available at The University College. He decided to study physics instead. Having studied physics for a while, Stephen earned a first-class honors degree. After collage, Stephen went on to research at Trinity Hall, University of Cambridge, for a PhD in Astronomy and Cosmology. ' ' During his career, Stephen had won many accomplishments. Hawking was awarded the CBE in 1982, and became a Companion of Honour in 1989. He received numerous awards and medals, including becoming a Fellow of The Royal Society and a Member of the US National Academy of Sciences. He was honored with the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2009. He was greatly honored for his studies. After all, Stephen was the first scientist to devise a cosmology that married the general theory of relativity and quantum mechanics, and he made huge contributions to our understanding of black holes. It was during his young adult stage when his doctors started seeing disorders. At age 21, Stephen was diagnosed with Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS). The doctors first expected him to die 2 years later. Stephen was 76 when he died. A family spokesperson confirmed it. Full details are unclear but most people agreed that he died from a painful disease. It was not identified. Achievements ☀ Hawking Radiation As the name implies, Hawking Radiation is one of the discoveries we most associate with Stephen Hawking. It’s a concept that popped up relatively early in his career, and scientists have continued to study it all these years later. Understanding the ins and outs of Hawking Radiation requires some real expertise in physics, and the video above does a reasonable job of trying to explain it, but the high-level overview is easy to grasp. Instead of understanding all black holes as simple gravitational gluttons that can only ever grow in mass, Hawking Radiation explains how black holes can actually leak energy to the point of disappearance. Hawking isn’t the only researcher credited with helping us move toward a more complete understanding of black hole radiation, but his work on the topic was a substantial achievement. Environmental Advocacy One of the biggest risks to the wellbeing of humanity is climate change, and Hawking was a strong advocate for drastic alterations to industrial society to counteract the warming trend. Sure, he also warned us sternly about the dangers of artificial intelligence and the need to escape earth. Those statements were cause for many a headline, but his advocacy for our planet holds the most weight since the early effects of climate change are already upon us. He was warning heads of state about the consequences of unchecked emissions over a decade ago, and there have been numerous positive steps taken since then, but also setbacks. The current administration is dismantling environmental protections left and right, but we still hold out hope that cooler heads will prevail in time, and we’ll do Hawking’s memory proud by doubling our efforts. Public Awareness of People With Disabilities Early in his adult life, Hawking was infamously diagnosed with a rare form of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS). While the deterioration of his motor control was slower than most other cases, and his lifespan was surprisingly long, his body eventually became almost entirely inoperable. In spite of his worsening condition, he was able to continue his research for many decades thanks to top of the line healthcare and technology. Even without the ability to speak or move his limbs, the use of a speech-generating device and specialized movement trackers allowed him to continue to speak publicly. Due in part to his own experiences, he was also an outspoken proponent of the UK’s National Health Service and stem-cell research. Staunch advocacy from such a prominent voice is immeasurably useful for those causes. Hawking’s successes serve as an inspiration to us all, and as a stark reminder of what one can achieve even in the face of severe adversity. Not only do people with disabilities deserve respect and compassion, but we should take care to never box anyone in with pre-conceived notions of what any individual is capable of accomplishing. Singularities Another important aspect of Hawking’s legacy is his attempts to understand the implications of the extremely dense center of black holes. Inside one, it’s theorized that we can find a gravitational singularity – a point of infinite density. Along with Roger Penrose, Hawking’s work informs the way we think about black holes – and even the nature of the Big Bang. While the origin of our universe is still fervently debated, and the quantum details get rather hairy, the popular understanding of all of the matter of our universe being squeezed into a single point is partially thanks to Hawking’s extensive work. Spreading Science to the Masses There are few scientists in history who have been able to reach laymen as well as Hawking. With his beloved book A Brief History of Time, he made cosmology and basic scientific principles approachable to generations of readers. The Carl Sagans, Neil deGrasse Tysons, and Stephen Hawkings of the world have the ability to take real-life research, and make it into something that can inspire both children and adults. Personally, I had almost no appreciation for the sheer awe of the universe until I was first exposed to Carl Sagan’s Cosmos. Hawking achieved something equally impressive with his books, speeches, and television appearances. Beyond the wide-eyed excitement about the real-world science, his research and public outreach helped fuel the imaginations of countless science fiction authors as well. Our shelves are stacked with books that Stephen Hawking touched in some way – big or small. In turn, those stories will generate excitement for a new generation of scientists and writers. Family ☀ Hawking was born on 8 January 194224 in Oxford to Frank (1905–1986)25 and Isobel Eileen Hawking (née Walker; 1915–2013).262728 Hawking's mother was born into a family of doctors in Glasgow, Scotland.2930 His wealthy paternal great-grandfather, from Yorkshire, over-extended himself buying farm land and then went bankrupt in the great agricultural depression during the early 20th century.30 His paternal great-grandmother saved the family from financial ruin by opening a school in their home.30 Despite their families' financial constraints, both parents attended the University of Oxford, where Frank read medicine and Isobel read Philosophy, Politics and Economics.27 Isobel worked as a secretary for a medical research institute, and Frank was a medical researcher.2731 Hawking had two younger sisters, Philippa and Mary, and an adopted brother, Edward Frank David (1955–2003).3233 In 1950, when Hawking's father became head of the division of parasitology at the National Institute for Medical Research, the family moved to St Albans, Hertfordshire.3435 In St Albans, the family was considered highly intelligent and somewhat eccentric;3436 meals were often spent with each person silently reading a book.34 They lived a frugal existence in a large, cluttered, and poorly maintained house and travelled in a converted London taxicab.3738 During one of Hawking's father's frequent absences working in Africa,39 the rest of the family spent four months in Majorca visiting his mother's friend Beryl and her husband, the poet Robert Graves.40\ Career * 1966–1975 In his work, and in collaboration with Penrose, Hawking extended the concepts first explored in his doctoral thesis. This included not only the existence of singularities but also the theory that the universe might have started as a singularity. Their joint essay was the runner-up in the 1968 competition. In 1970 they published a proof that if the universe obeys and fits any of the of developed by , then it must have begun as a singularity. In 1969, Hawking accepted a specially created Fellowship for Distinction in Science to remain at Caius. In 1970, Hawking postulated what became known as , that the event horizon of a black hole can never get smaller. With and , he proposed the four , drawing an analogy with . To Hawking's irritation, , a graduate student of , went further—and ultimately correctly—to apply thermodynamic concepts literally. In the early 1970s, Hawking's work with Carter, Werner Israel and David C. Robinson strongly supported Wheeler's , one that states that no matter what the original material from which a black hole is created, it can be completely described by the properties of , and rotation. His essay titled "Black Holes" won the Award in January 1971. Hawking's first book, ,'' written with , was published in 1973. Beginning in 1973, Hawking moved into the study of and . His work in this area was spurred by a visit to Moscow and discussions with and , whose work showed that according to the , rotating black holes emit particles. To Hawking's annoyance, his much-checked calculations produced findings that contradicted his second law, which claimed black holes could never get smaller, and supported Bekenstein's reasoning about their . His results, which Hawking presented from 1974, showed that black holes emit radiation, known today as , which may continue until they exhaust their energy and . Initially, Hawking radiation was controversial. By the late 1970s and following the publication of further research, the discovery was widely accepted as a significant breakthrough in theoretical physics. Hawking was elected a , a few weeks after the announcement of Hawking radiation. At the time, he was one of the youngest scientists to become a Fellow. Hawking was appointed to the Sherman Fairchild Distinguished visiting professorship at the (Caltech) in 1970. He worked with a friend on the faculty, , and engaged him in a about whether the was a black hole. The wager was an "insurance policy" against the proposition that black holes did not exist. Hawking acknowledged that he had lost the bet in 1990, a bet that was the first of several he was to make with Thorne and others. Hawking had maintained ties to Caltech, spending a month there almost every year since this first visit. 1975–1990 Hawking returned to Cambridge in 1975 to a more academically senior post, as in gravitational physics. The mid to late 1970s were a period of growing public interest in black holes and the physicists who were studying them. Hawking was regularly interviewed for print and television. He also received increasing academic recognition of his work. In 1975, he was awarded both the and the , and in 1976 the , the and the . He was appointed a professor with a chair in in 1977. The following year he received the and an honorary doctorate from the University of Oxford. In 1979, Hawking was elected at the University of Cambridge. His inaugural lecture in this role was titled: "Is the End in Sight for Theoretical Physics?" and proposed as the leading theory to solve many of the outstanding problems physicists were studying. His promotion coincided with a health crisis which led to his accepting, albeit reluctantly, some nursing services at home. At the same time, he was also making a transition in his approach to physics, becoming more intuitive and speculative rather than insisting on mathematical proofs. "I would rather be right than rigorous", he told Kip Thorne. In 1981, he proposed that information in a black hole is irretrievably lost when a black hole evaporates. This violates the fundamental tenet of quantum mechanics, and led to years of debate, including "" with and . – a theory proposing that following the Big Bang, the universe initially expanded incredibly rapidly before settling down to a slower expansion – was proposed by and also developed by . Following a conference in Moscow in October 1981, Hawking and organised a three-week Nuffield Workshop in the summer of 1982 on "The Very Early Universe" at Cambridge University, a workshop that focused mainly on inflation theory. Hawking also began a new line of quantum theory research into the origin of the universe. In 1981 at a Vatican conference, he presented work suggesting that there might be no boundary – or beginning or ending – to the universe. Hawking subsequently developed the research in collaboration with , and in 1983 they published a model, known as the . It proposed that prior to the , the had no boundary in space-time; before the Big Bang, time did not exist and the concept of the beginning of the universe is meaningless. The initial singularity of the classical Big Bang models was replaced with a region akin to the North Pole. One cannot travel north of the North Pole, but there is no boundary there – it is simply the point where all north-running lines meet and end. Initially, the no-boundary proposal predicted a , which had implications about the existence of God. As Hawking explained, "If the universe has no boundaries but is self-contained... then God would not have had any freedom to choose how the universe began." Hawking did not rule out the existence of a Creator, asking in "Is the unified theory so compelling that it brings about its own existence?" In his early work, Hawking spoke of God in a metaphorical sense. In ''A Brief History of Time he wrote: "If we discover a complete theory, it would be the ultimate triumph of human reason – for then we should know the mind of God." In the same book he suggested that the existence of God was not necessary to explain the origin of the universe. Later discussions with led to the realisation that the existence of God was also compatible with an open universe. Further work by Hawking in the area of led to the 1985 publication of a paper theorising that if the no-boundary proposition were correct, then when the universe stopped expanding and eventually collapsed, time would run backwards. A paper by Don Page and independent calculations by led Hawking to withdraw this concept. Honours continued to be awarded: in 1981 he was awarded the American , and in the appointed a (CBE). These awards did not significantly change Hawking's financial status, and motivated by the need to finance his children's education and home expenses, he decided in 1982 to write a popular book about the universe that would be accessible to the general public. Instead of publishing with an academic press, he signed a contract with , a mass market publisher, and received a large advance for his book. A first draft of the book, called A Brief History of Time, was completed in 1984. One of the first messages Hawking produced with his was a request for his assistant to help him finish writing A Brief History of Time. Peter Guzzardi, his editor at Bantam, pushed him to explain his ideas clearly in non-technical language, a process that required many revisions from an increasingly irritated Hawking. The book was published in April 1988 in the US and in June in the UK, and it proved to be an extraordinary success, rising quickly to the top of best-seller lists in both countries and remaining there for months. The book was translated into many languages, and ultimately sold an estimated 9 million copies. Media attention was intense, and a magazine cover and a television special both described him as "Master of the Universe". Success led to significant financial rewards, but also the challenges of celebrity status. Hawking travelled extensively to promote his work, and enjoyed partying and dancing into the small hours. A difficulty refusing the invitations and visitors left him limited time for work and his students. Some colleagues were resentful of the attention Hawking received, feeling it was due to his disability. He received further academic recognition, including five more honorary degrees, the (1985), the (1987) and, jointly with Penrose, the prestigious (1988). In the , he was appointed a (CH). He reportedly declined a knighthood in the late 1990s in objection to the UK's science funding policy. 1990–2000 Hawking with and at the 2001 Strings Conference, , India Hawking pursued his work in physics: in 1993 he co-edited a book on with Gary Gibbons and published a collected edition of his own articles on black holes and the Big Bang. In 1994, at Cambridge's , Hawking and Penrose delivered a series of six lectures that were published in 1996 as "The Nature of Space and Time". In 1997, he conceded a 1991 public made with Kip Thorne and of . Hawking had bet that Penrose's proposal of a "cosmic censorship conjecture" – that there could be no "naked singularities" unclothed within a horizon – was correct. After discovering his concession might have been premature, a new and more refined wager was made. This one specified that such singularities would occur without extra conditions. The same year, Thorne, Hawking and Preskill made another bet, this time concerning the . Thorne and Hawking argued that since general relativity made it impossible for black holes to radiate and lose information, the mass-energy and information carried by Hawking radiation must be "new", and not from inside the black hole . Since this contradicted the quantum mechanics of microcausality, quantum mechanics theory would need to be rewritten. Preskill argued the opposite, that since quantum mechanics suggests that the information emitted by a black hole relates to information that fell in at an earlier time, the concept of black holes given by general relativity must be modified in some way. Hawking also maintained his public profile, including bringing science to a wider audience. A film version of A Brief History of Time, directed by and produced by , premiered in 1992. Hawking had wanted the film to be scientific rather than biographical, but he was persuaded otherwise. The film, while a critical success, was not widely released. A popular-level collection of essays, interviews, and talks titled was published in 1993, and a six-part television series and a companion book appeared in 1997. As Hawking insisted, this time the focus was entirely on science. 2000–2018 Hawking at the to inaugurate the Laboratory of Astronomy and Particles in Paris, and the French release of his work , 5 May 2006 Hawking continued his writings for a popular audience, publishing in 2001, and , which he wrote in 2005 with to update his earlier works with the aim of making them accessible to a wider audience, and , which appeared in 2006. Along with at and Jim Hartle, from 2006 on Hawking developed a theory of "top-down cosmology", which says that the universe had not one unique initial state but many different ones, and therefore that it is inappropriate to formulate a theory that predicts the universe's current configuration from one particular initial state. Top-down cosmology posits that the present "selects" the past from a superposition of many possible histories. In doing so, the theory suggests a possible resolution of the . Hawking continued to travel widely, including trips to Chile, , South Africa, Spain (to receive the in 2008), Canada, and numerous trips to the United States. For practical reasons related to his disability, Hawking increasingly travelled by private jet, and by 2011 that had become his only mode of international travel. Hawking with University of Oxford librarian (left) and naturalist (right) at the opening of the , Oxford, in March 2015. Ovenden awarded the to Hawking and Attenborough at the ceremony. By 2003, consensus among physicists was growing that Hawking was wrong about the loss of information in a black hole. In a 2004 lecture in Dublin, he conceded his 1997 bet with Preskill, but described his own, somewhat controversial solution to the information paradox problem, involving the possibility that black holes have more than one . In the 2005 paper he published on the subject, he argued that the information paradox was explained by examining all the alternative histories of universes, with the information loss in those with black holes being cancelled out by those without such loss. In January 2014, he called the alleged loss of information in black holes his "biggest blunder". As part of another longstanding scientific dispute, Hawking had emphatically argued, and bet, that the would never be found. The particle was proposed to exist as part of the theory by in 1964. Hawking and Higgs engaged in a heated and public debate over the matter in 2002 and again in 2008, with Higgs criticising Hawking's work and complaining that Hawking's "celebrity status gives him instant credibility that others do not have." The particle was discovered in July 2012 at following construction of the . Hawking quickly conceded that he had lost his bet and said that Higgs should win the , which he did in 2013. Hawking holding a public lecture at the congress centre, 24 August 2015 In 2007, Hawking and his daughter published , a children's book designed to explain theoretical physics in an accessible fashion and featuring characters similar to those in the Hawking family. The book was followed by in 2009, 2011, 2014 and 2016. In 2002, following a UK-wide vote, the included Hawking in their list of the . He was awarded the from the (2006), the , which is America's highest civilian honour (2009), and the Russian (2013). Several buildings have been named after him, including the Stephen W. Hawking Science Museum in , El Salvador, the Stephen Hawking Building in Cambridge, and the at the in Canada. Appropriately, given Hawking's association with time, he unveiled the mechanical "Chronophage" (or time-eating) at in September 2008. During his career, Hawking supervised 39 successful PhD students. One doctoral student did not successfully complete the PhD. As required by Cambridge University regulations, Hawking retired as Lucasian Professor of Mathematics in 2009. Despite suggestions that he might leave the United Kingdom as a protest against public funding cuts to basic scientific research, Hawking worked as director of research at the Cambridge University Department of Applied Mathematics and Theoretical Physics. On 28 June 2009, as a tongue-in-cheek test of his 1992 conjecture that travel into the past is effectively impossible, Hawking held a party open to all, complete with hors d'oeuvres and iced champagne, but publicised the party only after it was over so that only time-travellers would know to attend; as expected, nobody showed up to the party. On 20 July 2015, Hawking helped launch , an effort to search for . Hawking created Stephen Hawking: Expedition New Earth, a documentary on space colonisation, as a 2017 episode of . In August 2015, Hawking said that not all information is lost when something enters a black hole and there might be a possibility to retrieve information from a black hole according to his theory. In July 2017, Hawking was awarded an Honorary Doctorate from . Hawking's final paper – A smooth exit from eternal inflation? – was published in the on 27 April 2018. Disability Hawking had a rare early-onset slow-progressing form of motor neurone disease (MND; also known as amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, "ALS", or Lou Gehrig's disease), a terminal illness that affects and causes the deaths of neurones that control the brain and the spinal cord, that gradually paralysed him over the decades.21 Hawking had experienced increasing clumsiness during his final year at Oxford, including a fall on some stairs and difficulties when rowing.253254 The problems worsened, and his speech became slightly slurred and his family noticed the changes when he returned home for Christmas, and medical investigations were begun.255256 The MND diagnosis came when Hawking was 21, in 1963. At the time, doctors gave him a life expectancy of two years.257258 In the late 1960s, Hawking's physical abilities declined: he began to use crutches and could no longer give lectures regularly.259 As he slowly lost the ability to write, he developed compensatory visual methods, including seeing equations in terms of geometry.260261 The physicist Werner Israel later compared the achievements to Mozart composing an entire symphony in his head.262263 Hawking was fiercely independent and unwilling to accept help or make concessions for his disabilities. He preferred to be regarded as "a scientist first, popular science writer second, and, in all the ways that matter, a normal human being with the same desires, drives, dreams, and ambitions as the next person."264 His wife, Jane Hawking, later noted: "Some people would call it determination, some obstinacy. I've called it both at one time or another."265 He required much persuasion to accept the use of a wheelchair at the end of the 1960s,266 but ultimately became notorious for the wildness of his wheelchair driving.267 Hawking was a popular and witty colleague, but his illness, as well as his reputation for brashness, distanced him from some.265 Hawking's speech deteriorated, and by the late 1970s he could be understood by only his family and closest friends. To communicate with others, someone who knew him well would interpret his speech into intelligible speech.268 Spurred by a dispute with the university over who would pay for the ramp needed for him to enter his workplace, Hawking and his wife campaigned for improved access and support for those with disabilities in Cambridge,269270 including adapted student housing at the university.271 In general, Hawking had ambivalent feelings about his role as a disability rights champion: while wanting to help others, he also sought to detach himself from his illness and its challenges.272 His lack of engagement in this area led to some criticism.273 During a visit to CERN on the border of France and Switzerland in mid-1985, Hawking contracted pneumonia, which in his condition was life-threatening; he was so ill that Jane was asked if life support should be terminated. She refused, but the consequence was a tracheotomy, which required round-the-clock nursing care and the removal of what remained of his speech.274275 The National Health Service was ready to pay for a nursing home, but Jane was determined that he would live at home. The cost of the care was funded by an American foundation.276277 Nurses were hired for the three shifts required to provide the round-the-clock support he required. One of those employed was Elaine Mason, who was to become Hawking's second wife.278 For his communication, Hawking initially raised his eyebrows to choose letters on a spelling card,279 but in 1986 he received a computer program called the "Equalizer" from Walter Woltosz, CEO of Words Plus, who had developed an earlier version of the software to help his mother-in-law, who also suffered from ALS and had lost her ability to speak and write.280 In a method he used for the rest of his life, Hawking could now simply press a switch to select phrases, words or letters from a bank of about 2,500–3,000 that were scanned.281282 The program was originally run on a desktop computer. Elaine Mason's husband, David, a computer engineer, adapted a small computer and attached it to his wheelchair.283 Released from the need to use somebody to interpret his speech, Hawking commented that "I can communicate better now than before I lost my voice."284 The voice he used had an American accent and is no longer produced.285286 Despite the later availability of other voices, Hawking retained this original voice, saying that he preferred it and identified with it.287 Originally, Hawking activated a switch using his hand and could produce up to 15 words a minute.152 Lectures were prepared in advance and were sent to the speech synthesizer in short sections to be delivered.285 Hawking gradually lost the use of his hand, and in 2005 he began to control his communication device with movements of his cheek muscles,288289290 with a rate of about one word per minute.289 With this decline there was a risk of his developing locked-in syndrome, so Hawking collaborated with Intel researchers on systems that could translate his brain patterns or facial expressions into switch activations. After several prototypes that did not perform as planned, they settled on an adaptive word predictor made by the London-based startup SwiftKey, which used a system similar to his original technology. Hawking had an easier time adapting to the new system, which was further developed after inputting large amounts of Hawking's papers and other written materials and uses predictive software similar to other smartphone keyboards.290280182291 By 2009 he could no longer drive his wheelchair independently, but the same people who created his new typing mechanics were working on a method to drive his chair using movements made by his chin. This proved difficult, since Hawking could not move his neck, and trials showed that while he could indeed drive the chair, the movement was sporadic and jumpy.280292 Near the end of his life, Hawking experienced increased breathing difficulties, often resulting in his requiring the usage of a ventilator, and being regularly hospitalised.182 Disability outreach Starting in the 1990s, Hawking accepted the mantle of role model for disabled people, lecturing and participating in fundraising activities.293 At the turn of the century, he and eleven other luminaries signed the Charter for the Third Millennium on Disability, which called on governments to prevent disability and protect the rights of the disabled.294295 In 1999, Hawking was awarded the Julius Edgar Lilienfeld Prize of the American Physical Society.296 In August 2012, Hawking narrated the "Enlightenment" segment of the 2012 Summer Paralympics opening ceremony in London.297 In 2013, the biographical documentary film Hawking, in which Hawking himself is featured, was released.298 In September 2013, he expressed support for the legalisation of assisted suicide for the terminally ill.299 In August 2014, Hawking accepted the Ice Bucket Challenge to promote ALS/MND awareness and raise contributions for research. As he had pneumonia in 2013, he was advised not to have ice poured over him, but his children volunteered to accept the challenge on his behalf.300 Plans for a trip to space In late 2006, Hawking revealed in a BBC interview that one of his greatest unfulfilled desires was to travel to space;301 on hearing this, Richard Branson offered a free flight into space with Virgin Galactic, which Hawking immediately accepted. Besides personal ambition, he was motivated by the desire to increase public interest in spaceflight and to show the potential of people with disabilities.302 On 26 April 2007, Hawking flew aboard a specially-modified Boeing 727–200 jet operated by Zero-G Corp off the coast of Florida to experience weightlessness.303 Fears the manoeuvres would cause him undue discomfort proved groundless, and the flight was extended to eight parabolic arcs.301 It was described as a successful test to see if he could withstand the g-forces involved in space flight.304 At the time, the date of Hawking's trip to space was projected to be as early as 2009, but commercial flights to space did not commence before his death.305 Awards and honours The citation continues, "Other important work by Hawking relates to the interpretation of cosmological observations and to the design of gravitational wave detectors."404 Hawking received the 2015 BBVA Foundation Frontiers of Knowledge Award in Basic Sciences shared with Viatcheslav Mukhanov for discovering that the galaxies were formed from quantum fluctuations in the early Universe. At the 2016 Pride of Britain Awards, Hawking received the lifetime achievement award "for his contribution to science and British culture". After receiving the award from Prime Minister Theresa May, Hawking humorously requested that she not seek his help with Brexit.405 Stephen Hawking Medal for Science Communication Main article: Stephen Hawking Medal for Science Communication Hawking was a member of the Advisory Board of the Starmus Festival, and had a major role in acknowledging and promoting science communication. The Stephen Hawking Medal for Science Communication is an annual award initiated in 2016 to honour members of the arts community for contributions that help build awareness of science.406 Recipients receive a medal bearing a portrait of Stephen Hawking by Alexei Leonov, and the other side represents an image of Leonov himself performing his famous space walk and the iconic "Red Special", Brian May's guitar.[citation needed] The Starmus III Festival in 2016 was a tribute to Stephen Hawking and the book of all Starmus III lectures, "Beyond the Horizon", was also dedicated to him. The first recipients of the medals, which were awarded at the festival, were chosen by Hawking himself. They were composer Hans Zimmer, physicist Jim Al-Khalili, and the science documentary Particle Fever.[citation needed] Black Hole discovery dedication In March 2018, it was announced that two Russian astronomers who discovered GRB180316A, a newborn black hole in the Ophiuchus constellation on 16 March 2018, had dedicated their find to Stephen Hawking, having discovered it two days after his death.407 Publications Popular books ** A Brief History of Time (1988)200 ** Black Holes and Baby Universes and Other Essays (1993)408 ** The Universe in a Nutshell (2001)200 ** On the Shoulders of Giants (2002)200 ** God Created the Integers: The Mathematical Breakthroughs That Changed History (2005)200 ** The Dreams That Stuff Is Made of: The Most Astounding Papers of Quantum Physics and How They Shook the Scientific World (2011)409 ** My Brief History (2013)200 ** Brief Answers to the Big Questions (2018)343410 Co-authored ** The Nature of Space and Time (with Roger Penrose) (1996) ** The Large, the Small and the Human Mind (with Roger Penrose, Abner Shimony and Nancy Cartwright) (1997) ** The Future of Spacetime (with Kip Thorne, Igor Novikov, Timothy Ferris and introduction by Alan Lightman, Richard H. Price) (2002) ** A Briefer History of Time (with Leonard Mlodinow) (2005)200 ** The Grand Design (with Leonard Mlodinow) (2010)200 Forewords ** Black Holes & Time Warps: Einstein's Outrageous Legacy (Kip Thorne, and introduction by Frederick Seitz) (1994) Children's fiction Co-written with his daughter . ** George's Secret Key to the Universe (2007)200 ** George's Cosmic Treasure Hunt (2009)200 ** George and the Big Bang (2011)200 ** George and the Unbreakable Code (2014) ** George and the Blue Moon (2016) Films and series ** A Brief History of Time (1992)411 ** Stephen Hawking's Universe (1997)412234 ** Hawking – BBC television film (2004) starring Benedict Cumberbatch ** Horizon: The Hawking Paradox (2005)413 ** Masters of Science Fiction (2007)414 ** Stephen Hawking and the Theory of Everything (2007) ** Stephen Hawking: Master of the Universe (2008)415 ** Into the Universe with Stephen Hawking (2010)416 ** Brave New World with Stephen Hawking (2011)417 ** Stephen Hawking's Grand Design (2012)418 ** The Big Bang Theory (2012, 2014–2015, 2017) ** Stephen Hawking: A Brief History of Mine (2013)419 ** The Theory of Everything – Feature film (2014) starring Eddie Redmayne420 ** Genius by Stephen Hawking (2016) -- Lee.humes 02:09, June 23, 2010 (UTC) Category:Browse